Welcome to episode three of "Over the Wall: The Abolitionist Hour with Critical Resistance." For listeners new to Beyond Prisons or our collaboration with Critical Resistance, this is a new, regular series that premiered in September of 2023. Hosted by members of Critical Resistance's The Abolitionist Editorial Collective, "Over the Wall" discusses articles and key interventions made by Critical Resistance's cross-wall, bilingual newspaper, The Abolitionist.
This special episode focuses on both issues of the newspaper that Critical Resistance (CR) published in 2024: Issue 41 on ecological justice that printed in June and Issue 42 on anti-war organizing that printed in December. Episode 3 is titled, "For a Livable Future: Building Movements to Stop War and Save the Planet," and Dylan and Molly are back, analyzing the shifting political terrain ahead and what this means for organizing against the prison industrial complex (PIC), against war, warmaking, and militarism, for ecological justice and collective liberation.
Together, they discuss key articles within both Issues 41 and 42, which foreground organized resistance to climate change, ecological collapse and crisis, war, genocide and imperialism, alongside policing and imprisonment. This episode includes a few contributing authors of both issues, including Rehana Lerandeau, Eva Dickerson, Judah Schept, Masai Ehehosi (who Issue 42 is dedicated to), Misty Pegram, and Tia Marie.
Issue 41 is available for free download on CR's website, along with some early release articles from Issue 42 while the latest issue is still in print circulation. Check out the newspaper, Issue 41 in full and the Issue 42 sneak peeks, as well as all past issues at: criticalresistance.org/abolitionist.
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Announcements:
Support one of CR's closest movement partner organizations–The Freedom Archives by giving a donation this year-end or new-year season. The Freedom Archives is an essential movement history resource based in the Bay Area that is celebrating 25 years since its founding. The Freedom Archives contains over 12,000 hours of audio and video recordings as well as print materials dating primarily from the late-1960s to the mid-90s. These collections chronicle the progressive history of the Bay Area, the United States, and international movements for liberation and social justice more broadly. The Freedom Archives have been an ongoing resource for CR's editorial collective, helping us with research and archiving each of our issues of The Abolitionist. Check out the archives online and donate today: freedomarchives.org.
Host Bios: Dylan Brown is a 24-year-old Black organizer and educator based in New York City, and has been a member of Critical Resistance since 2020. As a member of the New York City chapter of Critical Resistance, Dylan is organizing within the Abolish ICE New York/New Jersey Coalition on their current NY Dignity Not Detention campaign, which seeks to build power to end immigrant detention throughout NY State. For the past three years, Dylan has been an editor for The Abolitionist Newspaper.
Molly Porzig is a Bay Area based organizer and educator in California with nearly 20 years of organizing experience with Critical Resistance (CR). Molly is currently CR's National Media & Communications Manager, as well as the organization's project manager of The Abolitionist.
Contributor Bios / Guest Interviews: Eva Dickerson: Starseed eva (they/themme/baby girl) believes in a freer, greener future and is on a journey alongside their world-expanding friends to get there. The apple of their eye is the city of Atlanta, where they live, work, play, and experiment with the people in the city about how we might practice a more compassionate way of being together. Much of their organizing in the city is concentrated within the Ashview Heights, Vine City, West End, Bush Mountain, and now Gresham Park neighborhoods where their abolitionist ideology comes to life by way of childcare collectives, neighborhood farmers markets, community gardens, popular education campaigns, and earth-based projects.
Rehana Lerandeau: Rehana is the National Membership Organizer for Critical Resistance (CR). Based in Atlanta, Georgia, Rehana's roots flow from her hometown of Oakland. A previous member of CR's Oakland chapter, Rehana supports CR members develop abolitionist projects and campaigns across our chapter regions of Oakland, Los Angeles, Portland, New York, and (newly) Kentucky. In Atlanta, Rehana is supporting the campaign to stop Cop City and the campaign to end the Georgia International Law Enforcement Exchange (GILEE).
Judah Schept is a Professor in the School of Justice Studies at Eastern Kentucky University. He is the author of Coal, Cages, Crisis: The Rise of the Prison Economy in Central Appalachia (New York University Press, 2022) and Progressive Punishment: Job Loss, Jail Growth, and the Neoliberal Logic of Carceral Expansion (NYU Press, 2015). He is co-editor of The Jail is Everywhere: Fighting the New Geography of Mass Incarceration (Verso Books, 2024). Judah has been active for more than two decades with organizations and campaigns fighting for decarceration and abolition.
Masai Ehehosi was a co-founder of Critical Resistance and the organization's longest standing member who passed away April 1, 2024. A Muslim, and Co-Minister of Information for the Provisional Government of the Republic of New Afrika, Masai had over over 50 years of experience organizing for Black liberation in the New Afrikan independence movement. Learn more about Masai's extensive movement contributions in Issue 42 in the Feature Reflection piece, or on CR's website: criticalresistance.org/updates/long-live-masai-ehehosi
Misty Pegram: A Filipina organizer with the Education Committee of the International Cancel RIMPAC Campaign and a member of Anakbayan Hawai'i, Misty is currently living in the illegally occupied kingdom of Hawai'i, on the island of O'ahu in Waikiki.
Tia Marie: Tia is a Hawaiian youth organizer with Hawai'i Peace & Justice also based on O'ahu, born and raised in the Punahou neighborhood north of Honolulu, near Manoa Falls.
Music Credits: - Show theme song: "Taste of Freedom" by Steven Beddall
- Transition sound effects: "I Wish - drum loop" by Artlist Original and "Organic Drum Loops - Chill Calipso Groove" by AMUSIA
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